Emergence of Medical Tourism Globally

What is Medical Tourism?

Medical tourism has emerged as a popular trend in the field of medical technology in the past few years. It has been seen that a large pool of people prefer travelling to another country for a medical procedure that is usually not done in their country or is done at an extremely high price. Most of these people use low budget places and combine their vacation in the same trip, hence the name medical tourism.

Some of the most commonly carried out surgical procedures that have promoted medical tourism over the number of years include dental care, cardiac surgery, fertility treatment, cosmetic surgery, and bariatric surgery. Thanks to medical tourism, a lot of people have easy access to great medical services and can easy undergo much needed surgery at an extremely affordable rate. According to a survey, almost one million Americans travelled outside the US in 2014, in order to get medical treatment.

Reasons of Popularity

Medical tourism is rapidly growing in Asian countries due to affordable rates, specialized doctors, advanced technology, great hospitality services, experienced nursing staff, and most importantly great currency exchange rate. What truly boosts medical tourism is great medical services and international accreditation of the doctors. Since the cost is also low, some of the patients end up 70% of what it would have initially costed them in their own country.

Medical Tourism in all Parts of the World

Geographically, it is seen that medical tourism is segmented on the types of medical treatment based on the geography. Some of the areas that have experienced a bloom in medical tourism include Mexico, India, Thailand, Costa Rica, South Korea, Turkey, Singapore, Malaysia, and Turkey. Most of these nations are developing countries and medical tourism has proved to be beneficial for their country’s GDP. Some of the most famous key players in the medical tourism industry include Anadolu Medical Centre Turkey, Asklepios Klinik Barmbek Germany, Bumrungrad International Hospital Thailand, Clemenceau Medical centre Lebanon, Fortis Hospital India, Gleneagles Hospital Singapore,Prince Court Medical centre Malaysia,and the Wooridul Spine Hospital Korea.

Strategies Used

The strategies used by these famous companies include:

• Advanced surgical options
• Clinical information
• Educational articles
• Emergence as strong brand equity to gain competitive advantages
• Expertise and specialization in medical services
• High quality safety services
• Medical treatments in affordable prices
• Optimum comfort level to the patients

Not only this, in order to expand the business the companies also use tactics like affiliations, joint ventures, and collaborations, so that they can expand their business and give way to new medical opportunities. An example of a famous collaboration is between Bumrungrad International Hospital in Bangkok, and IBM Watson to improve the quality of oncology care.

Key Players of Medical Tourism

The best part about tourism is that it gives way to medical treatment for problems like

• Bio-compatible artificial joints
• Cancers
• Cardiology general surgery
• Dental care
• Gastrointestinal diseases
• In vitro fertilization
• Interventional cardiology
• Joint replacement
• Kidney diseases
• Neurology
• Organ transplants
• Orthopedics
• Plastic surgery
• Plastic surgery
• Urology
• Women’s health care sservices